<removed - My sarcasm is not needed here>
DogGone
JoinedPosts by DogGone
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42
Why are GMO's bad?
by cappytan inhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sh4bi60alzu.
first person to say, "this scishow episode is a monsanto conspiracy," is a rotten egg..
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14
Rutherford's Hitler Letter - An Alternate History
by cappytan inif you're unaware of the letter tinged with anti-semitism and offering tacit approval that rutherford wrote to hitler, see this article on jwfacts.. so, we all know the witnesses were persecuted quite a bit during the war years.
i personally had family that was in jail with brother schroder in the 40's for the crime of "peddling.
i'm an agnostic fader, however i still think the mob violence against the witnesses was deplorable.
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DogGone
I appreciate what you are saying, but doubt exposure of the letter in the US at the time would have caused any animus in the United States toward the JWs. We tend to look backwards in history with the benefit of hindsight and mistake the mood of what people became with what they were earlier.
What I mean is that this letter was from 1933. The mood in the US was not entirely anti-Nazi in 1933 nor immediately thereafter. There was a growing anti-Nazi Hollywood league, especially after 1936, but don't mistake that for how the political and business leaders of the day spoke about Hitler and the Nazi party. On the contrary, Rutherford would have been closely in line with many other commentators of the time. Now, as you move later into the 30's and the regime becomes ever more dark, the mood changed considerably.
Had this letter been written in 1942 and there after exposed in the US, yes there would have been all manner of extra hostility toward the JWs. But that is not the reality of the chronology.
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DogGone
Flipper: "however you do not view it as a crime against children or humanity to have " ABNORMAL sexual desire for children " ?"
Answer: No.
Apognophos: " perhaps partly due to shorter life expectancies (though they weren't as short as most people think these days)."
THANK-YOU. One of my biggest pet peeves is how historical life expectancy at birth is casually used to state how long people lived. This act of ignorance is not restricted to the public or the media; I have frequently seen scientists and erudite commentators make the same error. I start yelling at the paper, the book, or the TV when this happens. Fortunately, they never yell back.
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DogGone
Band,
I enjoyed reading your post and discovering you had investigated writing an op-ed for the NYT. For what it is worth, my view of the matter is close to yours. I see you were refering the the power of the sex drive in general and not this specific one in particular. It is true, we humans frequently do mad things for this drive, putting ourselves in all manner of risky situation.
Although some offenders take dramatic action to stop from re-offending, it is also worth pointing out some who have never offended also make great effort to never offend. If they were to tell some on this thread that they are a pedophile but are working hard to be safe and want others to know to increase safetly, some would want them dead. The thinking being they cannot be helped, are monsters, are evil, etc etc. Others, such as yourself, have a much more nuanced understanding of "want" and "do". We are betting served as a society to help these people. That is what I understand the article was saying.
Right now the proliferation of child pornography is exposing thousands who have the inclination and have never acted on it, beyond hoarding hideous images and videos. We could kill them all, we could lock them up forever, or we could treat them effectively.
As for treatment, the greatest proof it works is the significantly lower recidivism for those who complete treatment as for those who don't. The links are a few years old, but good old cognitive behavioural therapy [CBT] has success in controlling impulses - not eliminating them.
National Review of Medicine - http://www.nationalreviewofmedicine.com/issue/2006/09_15/3_patients_practice02_15.html
Institute of Health Economics, Edmonton - http://www.sexual-offender-treatment.org/93.html
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DogGone
Band,
It might interest you to know that the recidivism rate is not "so great". For a previous discussion of the many studies regarding this:
Otherwise, I appreciated your post. I was wondering how you came to the conclusion that there is no control of the drive? I've found you usually hold well supported opinions so I'm interested to learn.
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DogGone
Thank-you, to the usual suspects for your rational discourse.
I can't abide arguing with who can't grasp the difference between "want" and "did" or between "desire" and "action". It saddens me, since these posters are otherwise thoughful. This is just too painful and scary a subject for some, I fear.
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114
Early Evidence for 1 John 5: 7
by Perry initalic 4th and 5th century.
629 in the 14th century.
429 in the 14th century (margin).
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DogGone
Yes, the the old text was accepted for hundreds of years - we have done some reading since then, thankfully.
But, it is not just Westcott and Hort, it is also the text produced by N/A and UBS. But, this won't matter to you, I'm sure, if you've decided scholarship peaked 500 years ago and has been declining ever since. Not much that I can say.
Curious, isn't it, that no ante-nicene father, that no writings during the Arian controversy, reference this text at all? Might be an important scripture for Athanasius to point out, no? Also curious, that no early versions render it this way and not a single early manuscript. Strange how it only pops up in the late fourth century. Even more strange that such as Wallance, Robertson, modern trinitarian translations such as NIV, NAB, ESV, TEV, and dozens more reject theos as genuine.... doesn't matter?
Thank-you for your research, it shows pretty clearly that you choose the KJV because it fits your bias, not because you have concluded it is the most faithful witness.
Conclusion > Evidence - backwards, friend, backwards - Evidence > Conclusion
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114
Early Evidence for 1 John 5: 7
by Perry initalic 4th and 5th century.
629 in the 14th century.
429 in the 14th century (margin).
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DogGone
Perry, you
What do you say to the critique about your wild claim that Cyprian must have had access to the autographs of "John's" epistles? I'd say that is a pretty outrageous statement.
It is, I agree, evidence FOR the inclusion of the Comma Johanneum. This must be compared to the all the evidence AGAINST including it. It certainly doesn't argue that "it must be a valid reading". Goodness, if all textual criticism could be resolved so neatly we could fold up whole schools of scholarly inquiry!
On 1 Tim 3:16 - it does not say "God was manifest in the flesh". Look at an interlinear. That is a theologically biased translation where the subject is assumed for the reader - as bad as the NWT's throwing in [other] at will.
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My JW mom is now willing to "listen" to our side...Need advice pls
by 2pink inmy husband and i (both born in jws with extended family all "in" except for one of my sisters who left when we did) left the church 5 years ago.
we did not fade, we just didn't believe it anymore, told our families so and left.
obviously, big drama in our family after this, messy feelings, etc.
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DogGone
For a much better presentation than I have made: http://www.jwfacts.com/watchtower/governing-body.php
Of course, you can always ask her if she really thinks the trumpets of Revelation involve Cedar Point Ohio... But, that is almost too easy. And we made fun of Mormons for underwear...
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My JW mom is now willing to "listen" to our side...Need advice pls
by 2pink inmy husband and i (both born in jws with extended family all "in" except for one of my sisters who left when we did) left the church 5 years ago.
we did not fade, we just didn't believe it anymore, told our families so and left.
obviously, big drama in our family after this, messy feelings, etc.
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DogGone
I suggest pointing out any particular scripture will not suffice. Your mom will find a WT article which discusses it. It won't matter what it says, the fact that there is a WT answer, no matter how weak, will be taken at face value.
Therefore, I suggest a direct attack on the monster itself, the notion that Acts 15 supports the notion of a centralized governing body. The narrative the WT presents is that there was this happy little GB sitting around in Jerusalem who governed matters of doctrine and practice. Indeed, if you read Acts you can almost come up with that notion, Acts is such a sanitized, white-washed church history.
But, we have a completely different picture when we compare what Paul said about that body of old men. In Galatians 1 Paul goes out of his way to point out that he did NOT get his authority from "those who were apostles before I was". In fact, he only met Cephas three years after his Apostleship and did not bother with the others at that time. In fact, he was unknown to those in Judea. This was a GB?
Note how Paul goes on in Galatians 2 to describe his meetings with these folks in Jersusalem, these important Christians. He is very specific, very deliberate that he did not need, seek, want, recognize, thier endorsement. He was letting THEM know what he was doing, not asking permission. "those highly regarded men imparted nothing new to me. On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the good news." In fact, he talks about how he resisted Cephas later over the matter of the law.
Galatians, to me, shatters the entire idea of a central governing body in Jerusalem. Paul is saying, rather directly, that the Judean "Christians" were backward and working against Christ in thier adherence to the Law. Acts 15 is not a story of a governing body, but of the Jerusalem congregation coming to terms and accepting the teachings of Paul. It is the settling of a massive dispute between several power bases, not the expression of a single central power base.
Reading the two accounts side by side shows how the WT twists the story to create a pattern of authority which simply did not exist - the opposite existed.